


Blue Bunny

by ShokoBean



Category: Splatoon
Genre: And Pearl has no interest in children, Because Marina is 16 and a kiddo and she shouldn't date someone who is 19, But this is not shippy alright, Gen, Had this idea a while ago, Hewwo I'm alive, I don't know what this is tbh?, I will come to your house and fight you to the death, If you see this as shippy or anything, Marina is a useless lesbian, i really rushed this at the end I just wanted to be done okay
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-09
Updated: 2018-10-09
Packaged: 2019-07-28 17:17:14
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,447
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16246229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ShokoBean/pseuds/ShokoBean
Summary: Marina has nightmares. Pearl has a solution and it is fluffy and bunny shaped.





	Blue Bunny

**Author's Note:**

> The more I write the more obvious it gets how little I take my works seriously.

Living with an octoling was….  _ Interesting. _

She had found the young girl a few months back, scared and alone in a world that was so strange and unfamiliar and new to her. Pearl couldn’t help herself but take pity on her, and did her best to help. It took her seemingly forever to gain enough trust between them to get Marina into her house. Since then they had lived together, despite Marina constantly insisting that she shouldn’t take advantage of Pearls hospitality for so long. 

Pearl would each time that that was nonsense and that she’d be always welcome in her home. 

Pearl would often watch Marina move around cautiously, her eyes flitting from side to side as if she always expected an attack. Pearl was careful not to startle her, as the first few times she had done it on accident, it had ended.... quite painful for her.

She didn’t know where the younger girl was from, what she had been through, what she had seen. She couldn’t even imagine. But she wouldn’t pry. Unless Marina decided to tell her, she would be content with staying in the unknown. Of course, she was curious, and worried for her new friend, and _sure,_ _maybe_ it be dangerous to house someone you knew nothing about, but Pearl couldn’t help but take pity on the lost and lonely looking girl.

One thing she knew about Marina was that she had nightmares. Frequently. While the inkling often stayed up until late at night, avoiding sleep for no good reason except maybe her slightly self destructive tendencies, she would hear the pained, muffled noises coming from the restless girl, who refused to sleep anywhere but the couch. It made Pearl feel helpless to witness her in a state like that. But alas they wasn’t much she could do. The one time she had tried to wake her up, it ended up with Marina punching her in the throat, followed by her apologizing frantically the entire rest of the night. As much as Pearl tried to assure that she was fine and that she forgave her, despite the memory of being unable to breathe for a few terrifying moments sitting heavy her in her stomach, it was nearly impossible to soothe Marina. Eventually, when the excitement of the night left and exhaustion settled in, she sank back into a light slumber, holding on tightly onto the small inkling. Pearl didn’t mind, if it helped her friend, she gladly served as an oversized teddy bear

Thinking back to that now, as she sat in the dark, illuminated by the dimmed light of her laptop but with her eyes on the shifting octoling, a thought shot through her head. In the light of day, with a clear head and a healthy amount of hours to sleep, she probably would have deemed it a dumb, silly idea. But none of that was the case right now, so as quietly as she could she darted into her room to retrieve something, an item she treasured dearly, but if it would give any relief to her friends troubled sleep, she would gladly give it up.

She tiptoed back into the small living room, sighing when she saw octoling sitting up straight, her eyes frantically scanning the room. The smalle noise from Pearl alerted her to the inklings presence, her head snapping into her direction. 

“Sorry for waking you up. I did try to be quiet, but I’ve always been bad at that.” 

She knew she was. She was told too many times that she was too loud to forget it.

“That’s not it… I woke up and you were gone and I was…” Marina directed her gaze to her hands, wringing them in one of her many nervous habits.

“I was scared…”

 

She kept her eyes on her restless hands. She was a soldier. Skilled. Fearless. Deadly. She wasn’t supposed to be scared. Wasn’t supposed to be so weak and helpless and dependant on someone else. Yet here she was. She barely knew Pearl and yet she was terrified that the inkling had left her alone. She closed her eyes and took a shaky breath, an attempt to calm herself. A soft hand was placed on her arm, the touch as light as a feather. She glanced at the older girl, who smiled sheepishly. 

“Sorry ‘bout that Rina, didn’t mean to give ya a scare. I just, uh… got ya a little somethin’.”

Pearl paused, and only now did the octoling notice that she seemed to be hiding something behind her back. The octoling felt her defenses instinctively rising, her muscles tensing, expecting an attack, danger, just,  _ something  _ to happen. The hand on her shoulder disappeared, and she tensed up even more, ready to defend herself against an attack that never came. 

“Heyyyy...Marina relax, I won’t hurt you… I just uh… got you a new little friend. It might be stupid, but it helped me sleep when I was kid, uh, still kinda does, so I thought it might help with your nightmares…” 

The small squid avoided her gaze, her face flushed and her hands fumbling behind her back, until she finally revealed, holding a weirdly shaped creature. A stuffed animal, Marina assumed. She’d heard of them. It had long ears and stubby limbs, with a rather long snout and small black eyes. It’s...fur? had a pale blue color, although it had probably been brighter at some point. All in all it looked worn out and old. 

“I know it doesn’t look that nice but I had hi- it a long time, so uh...yeah.”

Marina carefully took the stuffed animal, holding it as if it would break at any moment. It was a silly thing to do, she realized, since it was made out of fabric and wouldn’t be damaged that easily, but she could feel that it was important to Pearl, and it made her want to treasure it as much as the inkling did.

“It’s uh, it’s supposed to be a bunny. They’re extinct, sadly, although I heard that the Squid Research Lab is working on cloning them and other animals from DNA they discovered, but who knows what they are always up to.”

She coughed nervously. Somewhere in her head she knew that Marina didn’t grow up in this society and probably didn’t care about Pearl still sleeping with a stuffed animal, but the voice of shame and embarrassment was always louder than the one of reason.

“Thanks.” 

It was quiet, barely audible, but Pearl picked it up anyway, her ears giving a small twitch. She couldn’t stop a grin from forming on her face. 

“It’s no problem Mar! Anything for a friend!”

Marina nodded silently, burying her face into the bunny’s fur. Something about it calmed her instantly. 

“I really think this helps…”

She felt a quick pat on her head and buried her face deeper into the plushy. For some reason she felt a burning sensation in her cheeks. Maybe she was ill.

“Alright, try to get some more sleep, okay? I’ll be here, so don’t worry.”

A nod and a sigh was her only response, before the younger girl curled back up on the couch, wrapping herself into the blanket Pearl had given to her when she first started staying at her place. She refused to sleep in her bed, so Pearl refused to do the same and would instead sleep in her big cushioned seat whenever she couldn’t resist the heaviness of her eyes any longer.

In fact, in this moment, sleep suddenly seemed really good. She didn’t want to go back to browsing on her laptop or playing any of her games, she just didn’t have the energy anymore to do really anything. She switched off the small lamp on her table, grabbed her own blanket and slammed herself down into the seat. While her eyelids grew heavier she stared up at the ceiling in the dark, listening to Marinas already soft and steady breathing. A smile played around her lips, happy to have brought her friend some relief.

 

___________________________________________________________________________

 

In the following weeks after that night, Marina felt a lot of things, but most of all she felt denial. She denied that the fact that Pearl thought of her made her happy. She denied how much Pearls gift meant to her. She denied how tingly she felt whenever Pearl gave her all her attention, or the warm feeling in her chest when she smiled. She denied that she thought that Pearl’s laugh was the most beautiful thing she’d heard since the Inkantation.

She denied that the small plush bunny calmed her so much, because she could catch Pearl’s scent on it. Most of all she denied that her feelings obviously went far above friendship at this point. 

She couldn’t let her know. Pearl would probably think she was gross or weird and kick her out. That wasn’t even that bad to Marina, but the thought that Pearl could dislike her terrified her to no end. 

It was easy. Just be quiet. Don’t act weird. She could do that. Pearl would never know, simple as that. 

It was simple to say, but it was often hard to tear her gaze away from the inkling, hoping no one caught her staring like some dreamy eyed little girl.

And yet it seemed to go well, and to her own surprise she adjusted to hiding her feelings, to shoving them into the deepest, darkest corners of her mind and lock them up in there.

 

Up until  the nightmares returned. And they returned with vengeance. Each one seemed worse than the last, leaving her exhausted and with barely any rest in the morning. The furry companion Pearl had given to her wasn’t strong enough to fight them anymore, and not even the faint traces of Pearl’s scent could calm her. 

Before she actually found her senses, she had already padded in front of the inklings door, who she could finally convince to sleep in her own room and not share the living room with Marina, coming to a sudden halt. She couldn’t just come into her room like that. What was she even doing here? She didn’t know, and her yet all she craved was to be near Pearl and be soothed by her presence. She just didn’t want to be alone in this moment. 

Yet she tried to step back already, when the door opened, revealing the short girl behind it. Wide awake and looking at her expectantly.

Marina stared at her in silence like a deer caught in the headlights. Pearl chuckled softly.

“Heard ya walking around ‘nd wondered if ya couldn’t sleep again. Wanna come in?”

She stepped aside, making space for the octoling to come inside.

She hesitated, but eventually caved in to her own desires and quickly padded inside the dimly lit room. The walls were painted in a soft, pale pink and white, the rest of the room decorated in similar colors. It was cozy. It felt like home. It felt like  _ Pearl.  _ In Marina’s mind, the entire room seemed to perfectly reflect Pearl’s personality. Yet it was the complete opposite of the way she acted when performing on stage. Pearl had taken her to a few of the gigs she had had. On stage Pearl was loud and angry and seemed twice her actual her size somehow. Both sides had such a crass difference, and yet, they both were Pearl. 

It was in that moment that Marina realized that stage Pearl was the personality that she showed the world, and Marina was one of the probably few people who got see a completely different side of her. The sudden realization made her heart speed up. To think that Pearl trusted her, an octoling that she barely knew, this much, set off a lot of feelings inside of her that she didn’t know how to name.

She quietly cursed in her language, hoping her blushing face wasn’t too visible. 

“Wassat cursing here under my roof?”

Marina jumped and turned towards Pearl, staring at her like a child that had been caught with her hand in the cookie jar. 

“Wh-”

The inkling snorted quietly, hiding her laugh behind a hand.

“Oh, don’t worry, I’m just kidding, Mar. But I tried to pick up some Octarian lately. You’ve come into a strange world and have to adjust to everything, thought I could make it at least a  _ little _ more homely.”

She scratched the back of her head sheepishly, averting her gaze.

Marina smiled, telling her feelings to shut the fuck up for a second.

“Thanks. Really, thank you. It… it means a lot, Pearl.”

“Hey, it’s no problem at all! Anything for my best friend.”

She turned her attention to her laptop, so she didn’t see Marina almost experiencing a heart attack at the knowledge that Pearl saw her as her best friend.

“You should get back to sleep soon. You’re a kiddo, need your sleep and stuff.”

“You sleep much less than me anyway! You’re the one who needs more sleep! Besides, I’m not that much younger than you!”

Pearl, who had by now taken a seat in her spinning chair, slowly turned back to Marina, before resting her head on her hand, a lopsided grin on her face.

“Marmar, three years don’t seem much, but trust me, there’s a world of difference between 16 and 19.”

She sighed and stretched, closing her laptop. 

“But if it makes you happy, I’ll try to sleep for a bit, alright?”

Marina tried not to pout, and to ignore the stinging in her heart. Pearl saw her as just a kid. 

(A few years later she would back on it and realize that that was probably a good thing.)

“It would make me happy if you slept for once.”

“Alright, alright, mom.” The inkling laughed, getting up from her chair. 

“You can take the bed tonight then. You’ve been sleeping on the couch long enough now, honestly.”

“We can share the bed!” 

Many things went through Marinas head after those words left her mouth. Most of them were mental screaming in various different ways. Cod why did she say that? Why did she suggest that? She was being so absolutely obvious with her feelings! Pearl definitely thought she was weird! 

“If you don’t mind it…”

The screaming intensified tenfold.

“Not at all.”

“Alrighty then.”

And so Marina ended up in bed right next to Pearl, completely unable to ignore how warm Pearl was and how much she wanted to hug her and how she was completely surrounded by her scent.

It was going to be a long night.

**Author's Note:**

> Soo uhhh congrats you made it here. if it was boring and dry, don't worry I hated writing it more! I wanted to explore something different with this I think but then halfway through became desinterested in the oneshot but also didn't want to abandon it so. Here we are.  
> Anyways, I'll retreat to my writing den and hopefully bring out something better in the near future.


End file.
